Health performance indicators of housing

ABSTRACT Healthy housing strategies tend to focus on good comfort and on avoiding specific health risk agents. These agents are generated by building features and occupancy and may come from both indoor and outdoor environments. This research project focuses on building features and the impact they have on the indoor environment. The interaction between the building and occupancy patterns is studied. This paper describes the selection of the smallest set of indicators that allows a simple but effective evaluation procedure of the health performance of housing. The indicators are the markers of the main health risk agents in the house: mould, house dust mite, radiation, Legionella pneumophila, aerosols, noise and injuries. A health performance evaluation tool is being designed on the basis of these indicators. The tool can support the design of housing retrofits and maintenance policy in the housing stock. The research connects health risk and building quality assessment and is situated in the field of sustainable building.